


Tantalus

by eternallygapingmaw



Category: James Bond (Craig movies)
Genre: Alcohol, Angst, Blow Jobs, Cock Rings, Come Swallowing, Consent Issues, Dirty Talk, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, Injury, Jealousy, M/M, Manipulation, Masturbation, Mindfuck, Misogyny, Phone Sex, Rimming, Shaving, Slow Burn, Snark, Unsafe Sex
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-10-13
Updated: 2017-11-06
Packaged: 2018-08-22 04:55:59
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 10
Words: 16,534
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8273714
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eternallygapingmaw/pseuds/eternallygapingmaw
Summary: In which James is obsessed but Q is always just out of reach.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> No, I couldn't resist them, not even for a week :P Expect a different dynamic this time, and a darker fic. Not that the last series didn't have plenty of moral ambiguity, but expect this - and some questionable attitudes/actions - to be ramped up a bit here.

The mission goes badly. It’s nobody’s fault. James barely makes it out alive. Not everybody does. He’s burnt, and bruised. His hands are the worst. He cannot say that he’s worried that this will be last time, that he’s too old for this now. He cannot say this, because he cannot even find the words to speak.

He’s in hospital. Opioid dragons, sleek and golden, cartwheel behind his eyelids. He’s aware that people come and go at his bedside. He doesn’t recognise them. Until, one day, he opens his eyes and turns his head, seeking the source of a faint noise in the room, to find Q sitting in an armchair, watching him.

Q is dressed in a plaid suit and tie. His parka is slung over the back of the chair. There’s a paper bag containing a bunch of grapes resting on his knees. He’s twisting them off the stem and popping them into his mouth one-by-one. Presumably he grew bored of waiting for James to surface.

‘Grape?’ he asks, holding out the bag.

Wordlessly, James raises his swaddled hands from beneath the bedclothes.

‘Ah,’ says Q, although he must have known.

‘You could feed them to me.’ Q looks as if he might be considering this, at least momentarily, so James decides to push his luck. ‘You do have the air of a Greek slave boy about you.’

Q snorts softly. ‘I think not.’ He looks around the room. ‘I’ll get a drip stand and hang them off it - lower it so they’re just out of reach - you’ll be familiar, of course, with the legend of Tantalus -’

James groans. ‘Q. Shut up.’

That has Q on his feet, standing over him, suddenly solicitous. ‘Are you in pain?’

‘What do you think, boy genius?’

Q leans in close and peers into James’ eyes. ‘Hmm.’ He’s so close, James can smell him. His skinny hipster tie brushes the bedclothes. He smells of outdoors - of autumn, thinks James, fallen leaves and cold air, he thinks it was summer when this all went tits-up and he has no idea how long he has been stuck here - and alcohol hand gel, and grapes. ‘I could hack the prescribing system no problem, but they’ve got you on a shitload of morphine already, I’m rather concerned that there’s a chance you could go into respiratory arrest -’

‘Just do it.’

And he does, even if he cannot quite hide the spasm of concern that passes across his face. James sleeps, and sleeps.

*

Q returns a week or so later, with a bunch of bananas. He offers to peel one for James. When James declines, he shrugs and eats it himself. James pretends to doze, when all the time he is watching Q from the corner of his eyes. The sight of Q’s smug, clever mouth stoppered by the banana’s curved length is undeniably pleasant.

To James’ surprise, Q is back again the very next day. This time, he’s bearing not fruit but a wash-bag and a white towel folded over his arm. Registering James’ quizzical expression, he says simply, ‘I don’t think they’re taking very good care of you in here.’

‘No,’ says James. He can’t be bothered to tell Q that his ten-day stubble is entirely due to an ongoing stand-off the nurses, who, to a woman - and a man - have refused to shave him ever since he settled a mittened hand upon their prettiest colleague’s arse. (He supposes it could be worse: they’re still washing him, albeit grudgingly, and in pairs. But the pretty, dark-haired nurse has obviously been deployed elsewhere). He has no intention of apologising. He knew full well it was inappropriate, and did it anyway. He did it to remind himself that he was still alive. Even if the notion of desire still seemed impossibly remote, like a pleasant holiday destination he used to enjoy visiting.

Damn morphine.

Damn _hospital_ : he’s had a gutful of this place and the dreary indignities of recovery, of eating mashed gloop served up with a spoon because he can’t hold a knife and fork, of peeing into a cardboard container. The cool evasiveness of doctors who won’t - or can’t - tell him when he can expect to get out.

When he will be mended.

_If._

But now - despite all of this - desire, seemingly so remote a mere few days ago, is rushing towards him, like a tropical island approached by speedboat, its warm sandy beaches belying the precipitous cliffs beyond. He could climb those cliffs, he could throw himself off. He might not survive the fall but he’s always been reckless, that’s just how he is.

Better that than this antiseptic half-life.

Q’s voice breaks into his thoughts.

‘So do you want a shave, or not?’ he asks.


	2. Chapter 2

James would not be terribly surprised if Q opened the wash-bag to reveal an antique cut-throat razor, a badger-bristle brush and a pot of Truefitt and Hill shaving cream. After all, the boy does have a fondness for theatrics - for all his stated aversion to exploding pens. But no: Q bears nothing more exotic than a disposable plastic razor, a flannel and a can of own-brand shaving foam. Somehow, James doubts that this is what Q uses at home, in his own bathroom. Which means either a) he only hatched his little plan after leaving for the hospital, and stopped off at a supermarket _en route_ to pick up the necessary supplies or b) he decided that using his own kit or favoured products might be misconstrued as somehow giving James ideas. Knowing Q’s love (some might say fanaticism) for forward planning - not to mention his own propensity for _getting_ certain ideas _,_ especially where Q is concerned - James suspects the answer is b).

As Q fills up the sink with warm water, James contemplates wondering aloud whether he even knows what he is doing - what with him being too young to shave and all. But for once, this jibe won’t wash: Q is sporting an uncharacteristic scruff of bristles on his upper lip and chin. He also has deep, dark circles under his eyes. His shirt is unironed. James doesn’t think he has ever seen Q look so tired - even when existing on caffeine and microwaved ready meals and three hours’ sleep a night, he somehow maintains a preternatural choirboy freshness. James wonders what has been going on to keep Q awake: it strikes him that _worry_ might have just such an effect. And that right now Q’s greatest worry could well be the recent critical injury and subsequent slow recovery of his most valuable double-oh agent.

It’s a pleasing thought.

‘Here.’ Q cups James’ chin in his palm. There’s a bit of awkwardness at the start, when he struggles to get the angle right (‘S’weird, doing this for somebody else’) and he raises and lowers the head of the bed several times, making little noises of irritation all the while. The unfamiliar sensation of their close, prolonged proximity only adds to the unease: James has to remind himself to breathe. But after a few minutes Q settles into his work, and James also feels himself relax. Whatever else there is between them, it’s nice to volunteer oneself into another’s care (which of course is not at all the same as having no choice in the matter: James will be glad to see the back of the nurses). All too soon, Q is humming his satisfaction at a job well done and shaking out the towel.

James rubs his cheek against his bicep, pretends to grimace. ‘You missed a bit.’

‘Where?’ says Q, sharply, alert at his proficiency being called into question.

‘Not on my face, silly boy.’

Q blinks at him for a moment, then jerks his head. ‘You expect me to believe that you shave your chest, is that it?’ He raises an eyebrow. ‘Or maybe your legs?’

‘Well,’ says James. He’s playing for time: he is aware that they both recognise this. ‘You know. For swimming. Reduces drag.’

‘Balls,’ says Q, although there’s a faint flicker of some undefinable emotion - amusement? curiosity? arousal? - behind his eyes.

‘I wouldn’t go _that_ far. Everything else is fair game though.’

Q sighs. He takes off his glasses, polishes them on his sleeve, holds them up to the light. ‘You won’t be going swimming anytime soon, James.’

‘Have you never heard of physiotherapy, Quartermaster?’

Q puts his glasses back on and gives James a look that could freeze lava. This has been going on for a long time now, thinks James: a ping-pong of innuendo and suggestion batted back-and-forth between them. Going nowhere.

‘Do the rest,’ says James. ‘Would you?’

Q hesitates for a moment before moving to turn up the bedclothes at James’ feet.

‘No,’ says James.

Q’s glance skitters along the length of his body.

‘You know,’ says James.

This is the moment where Q could feign ignorance, could tell James to go fuck himself, could scoff and walk away. Instead, he goes to the door and locks it, lowers the blind at the window. Then he lets down the bars at the side of the bed so he can stand closer, and picks up the canister of shaving foam.

‘I’ll try not to nick you,’ he says. His tone is perfectly bland.

‘Do try,’ says James.

Q folds back the bedclothes to the level of James’ knees. James is wearing a hospital gown, loosely tied at the nape of his neck and the small of his back. Nothing underneath. He’d much prefer to be naked, of course, but the nurses insisted that he wear _something_ , and pyjamas were too much to wrestle with every time he wanted to pee.

Q’s face is empty of expression as he tugs up the gown around James’ waist and works shaving foam into the coarse dark-blond hair around the base of James’ cock and balls. His touch is brisk, impersonal - in no way a caress - but before long James feels his cock lifting, lengthening. He knows he cannot acknowledge what is happening between them: to do so would make the fragile moment shatter like glass. Q picks up the razor and begins to shave him with short, deft strokes. He never falters even as James’ cock grows hard enough for the foreskin to ease back around the head. Hard enough for precome to gather at the slit.

James lets Q nudge his stiffening prick this way and that as he works the razor through his pubic hair. Both simple common sense and a certain disbelief that _this is actually happening_ dictate that he should remain absolutely still, absolutely silent. But when the back of Q’s hand inadvertently - _for sure?_ \- brushes the very tip of his cock, he has to stifle a groan. Those clever hands, those clever fingers: hands that build weapons, beautiful, lethal weapons, fingers that can take down governments, dancing across keyboards to convey the intentions of a brain that holds more deadly potential than James has in his entire (damaged, fallible, only-too-human) body. The sight of a slick of his own precome gleaming on Q’s knuckles is almost more than James can bear: he needs to know that Q is affected too, that he is not the only one who wants this. He risks a glance at Q’s crotch, and sees the front of Q’s ridiculous trousers tented by the rise of his own erection.

 _Fuck_ , thinks James, _oh, oh, fuck_. Lust surges through him. His cock jerks, hard. He doesn’t care. Q is studiously tracking the movement of the razor across James’ skin: his eyelids barely flicker at James’ crude - albeit involuntary - effort to divert his attention. _Damn you_ , thinks James. He wants to seize Q and slam him down on the bed, pin him on his back with a forearm held across his throat, rip off his clothes and -

He lets out a blustery breath through his nose, making Q look up. Their eyes meet. James hears his own voice. ‘Go on. Put it in your mouth.’

Q freezes. ‘What?’

‘My cock. I know you want to suck it. Make me come.’

‘No.’ Q looks away. ‘I don’t think so.’

‘All right. Get up here and I’ll suck you off instead. You’re so fucking hard, you must be -’

‘I said _no_.’ Q speeds up his ministrations, wiping away the lather with the flannel before dabbing perfunctorily at James’ groin with a corner of the towel. He tugs James’ gown back down over this thighs, covers him with the bedclothes. ‘There,’ he says, as if to a small child. ‘There you go.’ He puts up the side of the bed and starts putting the shaving kit back into the wash-bag, folding up the towel. He makes no effort to conceal his hard-on, the swell of it clearly outlined through his trousers as he turns away.

James clenches his jaw, turns his gaze to the ceiling. Every cell in his body feels as if it is vibrating with rage. He cannot trust himself to speak.

He wants to kill Q.

He actually, legitimately wants to _kill_ him.

Q slips from the room without another word. The door closes softly and James is left alone. His body aches, his face and groin stinging from the swipe of the razor, from the touch of Q’s fingers. He is still brutally hard, cock straining under the covers. He contemplates trying to pull himself off with his clumsy, swaddled hands, or else rolling over onto his belly and rubbing himself off against the unsympathetic cotton-poly of the hospital bedsheets. Maybe dragging a couple of pillows beneath his hips and forcing himself between them. But this would be a poor substitute for what he really wants his dick to be - in Q’s cool palm, easing between those plush, soft lips. More than that, he can’t think how he would clean himself up afterwards and he knows he could not deal with the condescension of the nurses. The notion that anyone else should realise his thwarted desire, his helplessness - it’s simply untenable. So he lies staring up at the ceiling, counting the panels. _One. Two. Three_. They’re some kind of white plastic, chamfered at the edges. _Twenty-two. Twenty-three. Twenty-four_. In time, his erection wilts, but the rage remains.

Q doesn’t visit him in hospital again.


	3. Chapter 3

_Six months previously_

Q doesn’t rank highly on James’ sexual hitlist, at least not at first. He’s not James’ preferred gender, for starters. But more to the point, James enjoys a challenge and - given that the boy was practically vibrating with desire at their very first meeting - he doesn’t think he’ll have to try too hard to lure the Quartermaster into bed.

He’s wrong.

When James finally decides that _yes_ , it’s high time he gave Q the shagging he so obviously and desperately wants, he’s very much surprised to find his approaches gently but firmly rebuffed. The two of them are quite often alone together in Q’s workshop: James takes every opportunity to spike the conversation with innuendo, stand a little too close, let his gaze linger in places it decently shouldn’t.

Q isn’t having any of it.

Within a matter of weeks, James thinks he wants to fuck Q more than he has wanted to fuck anybody, ever. He feels half-insane with lust. There’s no reason he can think of for Q not to want to reciprocate. He’s not aware that Q is any kind of relationship with anybody, man or woman - although he suspects that Q’s tastes are rarely, if at all, inclined towards the latter - and, frankly, it wouldn’t deter him even if he was. This isn’t about romance or commitment.

He just wants to fuck him.

No.

Scrap that.

He really, really, _really_ wants to fuck him.

James spends many distracted moments imagining what Q must look like under those absurd clothes: bones sharp beneath pale skin, an enticing badge of dark hair at his crotch. Thinking of that slender body moving beneath him, Q’s heels digging into the back of his thighs. Q’s fingers clutching at his arse. Unable to do anything more than take it as James pumps into him, over and over again. Hearing Q’s breathy moans as he makes him come.

James wonders whether he needs to make his intentions more obvious. Maybe Q is just so immersed in the world of logic and absolutes he is immune to hints and suggestion. Yeah, that sounds about right. James tries a different tack.

‘So how about dinner?’ he asks, after one late evening spent testing kit in Q-branch.

‘Dinner?’ Q frowns. ‘Oh, I don’t know. Something that I can shove in the microwave, I expect. As usual.’

James resists the urge to shake him, and tries again. ‘I meant, _would you like to come for dinner_? With me?’

Q pushes his glasses up his nose. ‘Are you heading to the canteen? Could you grab me a KitKat while you’re there?’

Frustration makes James angry, and reckless. When he finds himself following Q along a corridor - at a spot he knows is poorly covered by the CCTV system - he decides to push his luck.

‘Q,’ he says.

Q stops, turns, waits for James to catch up with him.

‘007?’

James puts his hand on the wall above Q’s head, leans in.

‘You know,’ he says, ‘I can’t help wondering how you’ll sound.’

Q averts his gaze. ‘Whatever do you mean?’

‘The noises you’re going to make. When you’re taking my dick.’ He lets his other hand brush against Q’s hip. ‘When I’m on top of you, ploughing this tight little arse -’

Q’s lips are parted. His breath is soft and tea-scented against James’ cheek.

‘Are you going to rape me?’ he asks.

James leaps back from him as if scalded. ‘ _Christ_ -’

‘Well,’ says Q, his tone frosting over, ‘are you?’

‘Jesus Christ. No. No. Of course not.’ Revolting, the thought that he could force himself upon this man - or anybody else for that matter. _And yet_. James has the sudden, queasy realisation that all along he has been telling himself that Q _wants_ this - that he only has to keep trying to find the right words or choose the right moment, as if Q is a lock that can be picked - despite Q’s repeated assertions to the contrary.

‘It’s just that things certainly seem to be heading that way.’ Q shrugs. ‘I’ve already made it clear I’m not interested. So if you persist in chasing me all over Q-branch, what else am I supposed to think? And just to warn you - whilst I don’t doubt that you could easily overpower me, I’d do my very best to knee you in the balls first. As hard as I could.’ His smile is tight.

‘I -’ James takes another step backwards. ‘Look. Q. This won’t happen again.’

Q sighs and rubs his forehead. ‘It’s already gone on for too long, James. I think it’s time for me take this little matter to Human Resources.’

‘Oh,’ says James. _Oh shit_ , he thinks. He’s well aware that his attitudes to certain of his co-workers have won him no friends in that department over the years, although the fact that none of said co-workers have ever volunteered a complaint has meant that he has never been held to account. (Although, really, why would they? They’re all adults here. Anybody who didn’t welcome his attentions should be perfectly capable of - _ah_. Well). ‘You don’t have to do that. Do you?’

‘’Fraid so,’ says Q.

*

Q is as good as his word. Within forty-eight hours, James has received a formal written warning, an almighty bollocking from M and - most mortifyingly of all - instructions that he is to attend an Equality and Diversity workshop run by Lambeth City Council. Maybe it’s just paranoia, but James can’t help but think that Q himself was responsible for suggesting this last punishment. Of course, he can’t turn up to the workshop and introduce himself as a secret agent, so he’s given a cover story - he’s ostensibly employed in the glitzy world of Croydon’s municipal carparks - and a cheap suit to wear especially for the occasion. _A low blow_ , thinks James, as he runs his hand over the jacket, feeling the static prickling against his palm. (And _car parks_ , for fuck’s sake: Q had once hurled a stack of fixed penalty notices at his head, so they scattered around him like confetti - ‘Tell me, are you simply incapable of finding _anywhere_ legal to park your vehicles before you write them off?’)

But James has long been accustomed to find the positive in even the most desperate of situations. As it turns out, there’s decent coffee, plenty of biscuits, and the various activities and quizzes appeal to his competitive streak. The attendees are split between the deeply earnest and the simmeringly resentful: James uses his customary charm to infiltrate both groups, then amuses himself by pitching them against each other. In the lunch-break, a number of attendees gather in a wind-lashed alcove the regulation ten metres from the building’s entrance to smoke cigarettes. Here, James is privy to an impassioned discussion about _gender identity_ that makes his head spin. Who even knew that anybody felt this way?

The next day, James pays a visit to Q-branch. The minions all turn to look at him as he walks past. They can barely conceal their mirth: news travels fast in this place. James ignores them, and makes his way over to Q’s desk. Q is as unruffled as ever, save for his hair. James’ fingertips itch just looking at him.

‘How was the course?’ asks Q, still tapping away at the keyboard. He doesn’t look up.

‘Illuminating.’

‘Really?’ This is clearly not the answer that Q was expecting.

‘Really.’

Q closes the lid of his laptop, swings around on his chair to face him. ‘All right. Consider this a debrief. What did you learn from yesterday’s little excursion?’

‘I think I get what all this is about now,’ says James. ‘I know where I went wrong. You’re one of those - asexual types, aren’t you?’

‘A _what_?’ Q, damn him, starts to laugh. He laughs so hard he almost chokes. The minions turn to stare as one, like meerkats. James contemplates slapping Q between the shoulderblades, but decides against instigating physical contact. Instead, he clasps his hands behind his back and stands stoically gazing into the middle distance, waiting until Q’s laughter subsides. The minions resume their work, visibly disappointed.

‘Deary me.’ Q lifts his glasses and wipes his eyes. ‘So, just because I’ve told you to stop harassing me, you’ve concluded that I must be asexual, is that right? Because I couldn’t _possibly_ have any other reasons for not wanting to sleep with you, could I?’

James shuffles his feet.

‘Anyway. You’re wrong. Whilst it’s true that this job leaves little time for a personal life, I very much enjoy having sex - with men, as I imagine must be fairly obvious. And just for the record, I _am_ attracted to you. You’re rather less cerebral than my usual partners, true, but that doesn’t mean I don’t find you attractive. You are, after all, an extremely attractive man.’

James blinks at him. He’s not even sure whether he has been complimented or insulted: possibly both, at the same time. Q holds up a hand, although James is feeling almost too dumbfounded to speak.

‘But that still doesn’t mean that I’m going to have any type of sexual relations with you.’

‘You’re not?’ says James.

‘No,’ says Q, coolly. ‘I’m not.’ He swings his chair back around to face the desk, lifts the lid of his laptop. ‘Good day, 007.’

There seems little point in attempting to rekindle the conversation. James nods, turns on his heel and walks away.


	4. Chapter 4

_Three months previously_

James will admit that Q has him baffled. He cannot grasp the concept of wanting somebody, knowing the other person feels similarly - and yet choosing to walk away. In his head, he runs through what he sees as the various possibilities:

 

_Q is seeing somebody else_

Q has a lover - or even _lovers_ , plural - to whom he is already committed, and James’ preliminary investigations (which, truth be told, have considered mainly of gossiping with Moneypenny) simply haven’t unearthed them yet. If this is the case, James might consider hinting that fidelity is vastly overrated, variety is the spice of life, and so on and so forth. For now, though, he thinks he’s better off keeping his opinions to himself.

 

_Q plays by the rules_

Q has turned James down out of some kind of misplaced sense of professionalism. After all, he’s only been in the Quartermaster role for a few months: maybe he has taken all the guff about workplace relationships in the employees’ handbook to heart (he’s obviously _au fait_ with the sections concerning ‘appropriate behaviour’, at any rate). James could - perhaps _should_ \- tell him that nobody else actually gives a toss. If they did, James himself would have been sacked years ago.

 

_Q knows him too well already_

Q has a certain other-worldly air, but he’s far from naive, and a key part of his job is to track James’ every move. By now, James is growing used to hearing the words _wear a condom, you great knucklehead_ hissed into his earpiece at certain mission-critical moments. Q might well be of the impression that all James cares about is getting his end away as often as possible - to hell with precautions or consequences. _Point conceded_ , thinks James. He can hardly blame the boy for being wary.

 

Of course, the sensible course of action would be to forget all about it, for him to suppress his desire for Q and move on - preferably by fucking some rather more accommodating bright young thing - but since when has James favoured _sensible_?

First things first. James calls in some favours and has Q tailed for a week, after which he is handed a plain manila folder (hard copy seemed safest, given the target’s particular area of expertise). At home, James spreads out the contents of the folder on his coffee table. A slippery stack of photographs, all covert angles and motion blur: Q in a riverside pub, drinking beer with a group of people whom James recognises as Q-branch minions; Q boarding a bus with his messenger bag slung across his chest, alone; Q opening an umbrella in the porch of a Victorian villa. Close-ups of the windows of the top-floor flat in the same building (grey Venetian blinds, lowered, a flowering cactus). Scans of supermarket receipts, a tag from a dry-cleaning service. Seven days in the life of an apparently single man with two cats, a fondness for M&S cottage pie and a wardrobe of designer cardigans. An internet browsing history or mobile log would have been nice - James would dearly like to know how Q spends his time online when he’s not at work, whether he’s perusing Grindr, playing chess, watching porn, whatever - but he’s far from surprised to read in the accompanying report that these were unobtainable.

At MI6, James endeavours for his behaviour towards Q to be utterly beyond reproach. He opens doors to let Q walk through first, brings him KitKats and cups of tea from the canteen. More often than not, his chivalry is met with a Paddington stare that challenges even James’ expert poker-face - but really, there’s nothing the Quartermaster can do. He can hardly complain about being bought tea made _just_ the way he likes it: Earl Grey, two sugars, a dash of milk.

(‘I like my tea the same way I like my men,’ James once heard Q tell Moneypenny, both of them unaware that James was lurking in the doorway behind them. Moneypenny cackled with laughter - ‘Hot and wet, you mean?’ ‘No, you bad girl,’ said Q, fondly. ‘Sweet, strong and English.’ James reckons he has at least two out of three boxes ticked).

They’re new to working together, and Q is new to MI6, but they soon settle into a routine. Q is undeniably competent: on a purely professional level, James feels reassured. And Q is not without a sense of humour - as long as James keeps strictly hands-off and doesn’t push his luck, he doesn’t seem to be averse to banter or even a little gentle flirting.

 _Good_ , thinks James. _Good_.

It’s still very far from being satisfying, but James has no desire to set himself up for another bollocking. He can play the long game. He might have a reputation for impetuousness, for hot-headedness, but it’s undeserved: he knows himself to have almost infinite reserves of patience.

 

And so it goes, until -

 

‘Q?’ says James.

There is a pause.

‘Mm?’ The voice in his earpiece sounds drowsy.

‘Did I wake you up?’

‘Yes.’ He hears Q yawn.

James finds his curiosity piqued: he wants to know where Q has been sleeping. What he can see around him, what he is wearing. Right now, James is in Tepito - that most notorious _barrio_ of Mexico City - lying on the bed in a run-down hotel room, two blocks away from the presumed headquarters of an international terrorist organisation. It’s early evening, July; the noise of backfiring cars from the street outside, drunken shouts and laughter filtering through the shutters. A broken-bladed fan gyrates unsteadily overhead.

‘Where are you? At home?’

Q laughs, but his laughter trails off into another yawn. ‘Don’t be daft. Got a camp bed set up at Q-branch.’

‘You’re in your pyjamas at Q-branch?’ James cannot conceal the amusement in his voice, even though the thought has his hand trailing along his thigh.

‘Pants and socks, actually,’ says Q - and maybe he hears James’ intake of breath because he adds, ‘- but don’t bloody _start_. There’s nobody else about right now. I’ve got a blanket. All perfectly decent. Do you think I sleep in a shirt and tie?’

James has hung up his own suit in the wardrobe before taking a shower and isn’t currently wearing anything at all. To inform Q of this fact might be considered oversharing, so he says nothing.

‘What did you want, anyway?’ asks Q.

‘Nothing important. I just -’ Missions consist of long periods of boredom and hanging around, trying to stay alert, interspersed with much briefer episodes of frenetic and usually life-threatening activity. James is finding the downtime harder and harder to cope with: whereas previously he might have diverted himself with sex and drinking games, now he seems to spend the waiting hours brooding over past hurts and the deaths of the few people he has ever loved. But he does not have the words to tell Q how painfully alone he feels. He can barely shape these thoughts in his own head. ‘I’ve been awake for thirty-six hours.’

‘Modafinil?’ Q’s tone is sympathetic.

James is faintly surprised to realise that he’d never before considered how Q copes with his own colossal workload: that would explain the endless cups of tea.

‘Amphetamines,’ he says.

Q sighs. ‘ _Not_ amongst the MI6-approved stimulants, as I’m sure you’re aware. Rather an unpleasant side-effects profile. Dependency. Paranoia. Anxiety. Where did you get them?’

‘From a man in a bar. Said I could call him Jesus. Told him I was well beyond saving.’

At this, Q tuts - audibly _tuts_ , in the manner of a purse-lipped maiden aunt - and James feels a warm glow, deep in his belly: somebody in the world cares enough about him to disapprove of the harm he causes himself.

‘You,’ Q says, ‘need to sleep. As should I.’

‘If only, Q. If only.’

‘Sleeping tablets? I’d exercise caution given your recent ingestion of amphetamines, but under the circumstances -’

‘Got none.’

‘Hot milky drink?’

‘Determined to pension me off, aren’t you?’

James hears a tiny, metronomic noise: Q tapping a pen against his teeth, thinking. ‘Alcohol would not be advisable right now.’

‘Agreed,’ says James. Very quietly, he reaches over the side of the bed, lifts the bottle of Scotch to the light. He’d say it was still half-full; Q would doubtless call it half-empty. He nestles the bottle against the pillow like a lover, scrubs his sticky hand over his chest.

There is a long silence. James inspects the bottle of Scotch again. Make that one-third full. His heart skitters unpleasantly. He puts the bottle down.

‘I suppose I could always…’ James begins. Q does not interject, so, emboldened by the distance between them, he continues, ‘...don’t orgasms encourage sleep?’

‘Now there’s a plan.’ Q’s tone is earnest rather than eager: James feels a twinge of disappointment. ‘Release of oxytocin and vasopressin from the posterior pituitary and prolactin from the anterior pituitary are believed to -’

‘I’m so glad you approve, Q. Pity we’re five-and-a-half thousand miles apart right now.’

Q huffs. ‘Didn’t I tell you _not to start_? You’re not the only one short on sleep, you know. Just have a wank and spare me the gory details.’ James is aware that he may have overstepped the mark, although Q sounds rather more amused than irritated: perhaps this, too, is a function of their current lack of proximity.

‘Can I take that as your official recommendation, Quartermaster?’

‘Well, I’m hardly going to suggest you go out looking for - getting yourself into trouble. Stay where you are. Go watch some porn on your phone, or something. Don’t they have cable in the hotel?’

‘No need,’ says James, silkily. ‘I am blessed with a colourful imagination.’

‘All right then. Suit yourself.’ Only now is Q beginning to sound the tiniest bit flustered. ‘You should get, er, cracking. So to speak. Goodnight, double-oh -’

‘Q,’ says James, before the Quartermaster can cut the connection.

‘What is it now?’ Q sounds deeply - albeit not unreasonably - suspicious.

‘Have you ever jerked off to something that wasn’t pixels on a screen?’

‘I -’ says Q. ‘I don’t have to answer that.’ His voice is so quiet, James can hardly hear him.

‘No,’ says James, ‘but you will, won’t you?’

‘I -’ starts Q again, then stops. ‘What do you think? I mean, really? I’m not some sort of fucking _robot_ , 007.’

‘Could I watch you?’ James asks. ‘One day, maybe?’

There is a terse silence on the other end of the line.

‘If you won’t let me touch you, will you touch yourself for me?’

‘I -’ says Q, again. The click of his tongue against the roof of his mouth as he swallows.

‘Are you touching yourself now?’ says James. He cups his balls with one hand. His cock is beginning to stiffen. ‘Because I am.’

‘ _Fuck_ -’ Q mutters, and James is sure he has never heard him sound like that, an undeniable veneer of arousal layered over his much more familiar tone of annoyance. ‘Oh, _fuck_ -’

James takes this as a permission of sorts, gets his other hand around his cock. Q says nothing more, makes no sound, but the mere fact of his presence on the other end of the line means that it doesn’t take James long to work himself up to full hardness, despite the drugs and booze careening around his system.

James doesn’t hold back. This is no time to tease. He works himself fast and hard, grunting with the effort of it, knowing that Q is listening. Maybe even doing the same, right at the same time. Crouched on his knees on his camp bed, pants yanked down around his skinny thighs. Cockhead slick with precome and his balls already drawn up tight. It’s the thought of Q tugging at his own prick that tips James over the edge.

‘ _Christ_ ,’ he gasps, thrusting up hard into the tight circle of his thumb and forefinger, spilling over his fist, and without even thinking, ‘ _Q_.’

James lets himself relax back against the pillows in a pleasant endorphin haze. He vaguely contemplates cleaning himself up before he goes to sleep. He thinks that if Q were here, he’d make him suck his wet cock, lap the streaks of come from his belly. Use a little bit of force, perhaps: both hands firm on the back of Q’s head, fingers tangling in that ridiculous hair.

Q would probably enjoy that.

Yeah.

Of _course_ he fucking would.

The silence in his earpiece is so protracted that - were it not for the minute buzz of static - James might think that Q had already logged off. After a while, he hears Q clear his throat.

‘007?’

James wants to ask him - _So. Did you -?_ \- but knows what’s expected of him now: participation in their habitual sign-off, the little ceremony that has somehow evolved between them. ‘Q?’

‘Good luck out there in the field.’

He doesn’t know then just how much he’s going to need it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Stay tuned for some major revelations from Q and the usual smut'n'bantz ~~hopefully a bit more quickly than this last instalment, sorry about that.~~
> 
> God I love these two.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter updates: they're like buses. Or something. Hurrah!

_Back to the present day_

As M, Mallory is far less forgiving than his predecessor, at least (or is that _especially_?) where James is concerned. This time, when James fails all his re-admission tests, no allowances will be made: that much is clear. So James goes back into training, resits the tests and performs rather better, but it’s still not enough: he fails the psych evaluation. There are rumblings that a third failure will raise some serious questions about his suitability to remain with the 00-programme.

James has been here before. Usually at this point he either plays the game and does what he needs to do in order to get through, or continues to make a mockery of the whole affair - either way the result has always been the same, and he’s regained his 00-status. This time, the idea that he should make any type of concession is untenable, even though he suspects that Mallory would take more than a little pleasure in witnessing his self-sabotage.

 _Fuck him_ , James thinks. _Fuck ‘em all._

If they want him out, he’s not even sure if he gives a shit anymore.

But on his third sitting of the psych evaluation, the psychiatrist is a woman. She’s young. She’s attractive enough. He can see the lace of her camisole beneath her shirt. James - whose sexual encounters since the two odd episodes with Q have been both heterosexual and vaguely unsatisfying - feels himself sit up a little straighter, preening. He knows Q is watching from behind the one-way screen. They’ve not even seen each other since that day in the hospital, almost three months ago now. He wonders if Q had a hand in this, or if he’s being ridiculous to think that Q even gives a toss whether he makes it through or not.

The psychiatrist is a professional, but James can tell that she’d love to know what makes him tick. He fixes her with his best hired-killer stare and gives her exactly what she wants. The way she shifts in her seat, he must be making her wet. Christ, how he despises himself sometimes: the merest whiff of pussy and he’s drooling like one of Pavlov’s bloody dogs.

She passes him.

He’s back in.

James hopes that Mallory is livid. He hopes that Q is pleased, but the following evening when he pays a visit to Q’s workshop - in order to be kitted out for the next mission, all quite legitimate - Q just frowns at him as if he’s never been away before launching into a lecture about his latest bit of gadgetry and how long it took to develop and how much of the Q-branch budget was sunk into the prototypes and how terribly, _terribly_ disappointed he will be if James fails to bring it back in one piece.

James mentally tunes out the tirade in favour of watching Q’s lips move - soft-looking, girlish lips that would surely look even lovelier moving up and down the shaft of James’ cock. Q stands barely an inch shorter than James, but he’s so much slighter, all elegant angles and a waist that many women would kill for. And as for that creamy, unmarked skin: the contrast between their naked bodies would be delightful. How James longs to have Q sitting astride his lap - cock buried deep in Q’s tight little arse - fingers fanned over the curve of his hipbones to guide him as he rides -

‘Christ,’ says Q. He plants his hands on those narrow hips. ‘You haven’t been listening to a bloody word I’ve been saying, have you?’

‘No,’ says James. ‘I’m afraid I’m rather preoccupied at the moment.’

‘Oh? With what?’

It’s late, and they’re alone in the workshop, but James lowers his voice anyway. ‘Thinking how much I want to take you to bed.’

‘ _So_ glad I asked,’ says Q, sarcastically: James, however, refuses to be deterred.

‘You want to know how I felt? After you left me in the hospital?’

‘I could say no,’ says Q, ‘but I imagine you’re still going to tell me.’

James closes his eyes. ‘Itchy,’ he says. ‘Never felt anything like it. Not even when I caught crabs from that showgirl in Caracas - you kept telling me over the comms not to fuck her, remember? Couldn’t keep still for a week.’

He hears Q snicker, and opens his eyes again.

‘You missed your vocation, Q. If you ever grow bored of running this toyshop, you’d make an excellent torturer.’

‘Do you think?’ For a few moments, Q appears to give the prospect some serious thought, then wrinkles his nose. ‘Rather a crude method of extracting information, to my mind. Besides - if the subject gets exactly what he asks for, how can that be construed as torture?’

‘When it comes to torture, Q, what’s withheld can hurt just as much as what’s dished out. Take it from me and hope that you never have to find out for yourself.’

‘So tell me.’ Q inclines his head. ‘How much does it hurt that I won’t suck your illustrious cock, 007?’

James assumes a stricken expression. ‘Darling, you have no idea.’

Q sighs, hooks his chair towards him with his foot and sits down. ‘Right then,’ he says, as he rolls himself over to his desk and starts booting up his laptop. ‘I’d hate for Q-branch take up any more of your valuable time.’

‘What are you doing?’

‘What does it look like? Some of us have got work to do.’

‘When will you be finished?’

‘I don’t know. Soon, I hope. Soon- _er_ , if you go away.’

‘And then?’

‘Then I’ll go home.’ Noting James’ expression, Q adds, ‘Alone.’

‘Come home with me.’

‘Why?’

James puts both hands on the desk, leans in, whispers. ‘Because I want to cook you dinner and blow you while you eat it. Because I want to lick your arsehole until you’re begging to sit on my cock. Because I want to plough your sweet hole until you cream yourself all over me. And because I know how you like your tea in the morning.’

‘Is that so.’ Q looks James very slowly up and down. James knows he is not quite back to full fitness yet, but he stands up tall and squares his shoulders under Q’s scrutiny. Then Q gets up and walks the few steps around the desk to James, until the two of them are standing face-to-face: close enough for James to see how the green of his eyes is complicated, like river water.

‘I take coffee with my breakfast,’ he says.

‘You little shit,’ breathes James. He’s almost intolerably hard.

‘Now, now, Bond,’ says Q, mildly. ‘Don’t make me ask Gareth to -’

‘Ask him to what? Slap my wrist again?’ goads James. ‘And since when were you two on first name -’

Q raises an eyebrow, and just like that, the penny drops.

‘Ha, ha,’ James says. ‘No.’

Q lifts his chin.

‘ _Mallory?_ ’ James cannot hold back the guffaw that escapes his lips.

Q gives him a look of pure, undiluted disdain.

‘You - you’re fucking _Mallory_?’ James is almost beside himself - but he cannot work out whether he is feeling mirth or rage. ‘Got a daddy kink, have we, Quartermaster?’

‘Goodness me,’ says Q. ‘Stand-up comedy’s loss is surely international security’s gain, isn’t it, 007?’

‘Christ almighty. Of all the - does he put you over his knee when you’ve messed up? Or what?’

‘I rather wish he would.’ Q looks wistful. ‘His hands are like bloody spades, can you even imagine?’

James endeavours not to dwell upon that particular scenario. ‘But - he’s _straight_ \- isn’t he?’

Q’s smile is tiny, secretive. ‘Not so straight he won’t let me suck his cock every once in a while.’

For a moment - and not for the first time - James imagines how it would feel to kill Mallory: sweet. But that thought is rapidly overturned by the mental image of how the two men must look together: suave, hawk-browed Mallory towering over the diffident, ever-so-slightly awkward Quartermaster. Jealousy and arousal twist at his guts. He thinks, too, of Mallory’s tone when he hauled James into his office to tell him that _sexual harassment of the Quartermaster will not be tolerated_ : a kind of weary, contemptuous disgust, his expression akin to that of a man picking up dogshit in a park. And all along Mallory was getting his cock sucked by that very same Quartermaster, maybe even whilst sitting in that very same chair -

‘Where?’ asks James.

‘I beg your pardon?’

‘Where has this been happening?’

Q blinks rapidly: _none of your damned business_ , he quite obviously wants to say. Instead, he gives a little one-shouldered shrug that makes James want to bite him, right at that tender spot where his neck meets his jaw.

‘I had you tailed,’ says James. ‘For a week.’

‘Yes,’ says Q. ‘We know.’

Well. They’ve definitely been at it in Mallory’s office, then. So either Moneypenny is covering for Q, or she needs to up her game.

‘If you’re that desperate to suck cock on government premises, Q, you know you could always come to me. Or even _off_ the premises, if you’d rather. Happy to accommodate. Just saying.’

‘That’s a very gracious offer, but I’m afraid I must decline.’

‘Why?’

‘I’ve seen how you treat women, Bond.’

‘What the hell is that supposed to mean? I love women.’

‘Maybe. Maybe that’s what you tell yourself. But you don’t _like_ them very much, do you?’

James can only stare at him.

Q continues, ‘Thing is, I can’t imagine it’s any different for the men you fuck either. And call me old-fashioned, but I’d prefer not be screwed by someone whose mind is already racing ahead to wherever he’s sticking his dick next.’

‘No,’ says James. ‘I wouldn’t treat you like that. I won’t.’ The words are out of his mouth before he even has time to think about them. He’s surprised to realise that they are true, or at least they are now. _Something_ has changed - the hit-and-run fuck he thought he wanted no longer seems as if it will be enough. And because he can’t quite bring himself to think what this might mean, he finds himself seeking refuge in childish spite, lashing out: ‘But if all we’re going to do is play these weird fucking games then why the hell do you even care, anyway? And if you want to be romanced like some kind of sodding princess, Mallory’s hardly going to put a ring on it, is he?’

Q barely flinches: his tone is cool. ‘So who’s acting like a shit now? When did you hear me say that was what I wanted - from him - or you - or _anyone_? And I’m not fucking stupid. Gareth will never leave his wife.’

‘Even if she won’t suck his cock?’

‘Mm.’ Q grins, more to himself than to James. ‘But for the record: I don’t have a daddy kink.’

‘You don’t?’ James reaches out a hand as if to touch Q’s cheek. When Q shoots him a warning look, James lets his fingers drift down to toy with the knot of Q’s tie instead. ‘Shame.’

Q’s smile is brilliant. ‘No,’ he says. ‘I have a power kink.’ Before James can even think of a reply, Q takes a pen from the inside pocket of his jacket, holds it out to him. ‘Give this back to me tomorrow. And don’t bloody lose it.’


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy New Year :D

_A power kink._

James smiles mirthlessly to himself as he drives back home. Funny, how he’s never before troubled himself to consider what motivates Q - but why should he expect Q to be any different from anybody else, including himself?

_Power. Sex. Money._

All right, so Q has never mentioned the latter - aside from a rant about Q-branch’s budget - but even though the way he dresses is quite far from his own taste, James recognises that Q’s prim cardigans and fussily-patterned shirts must be expensive. Stopped at a set of traffic lights, James entertains a brief reverie concerning the slow stripping of a well-tailored suit from Q’s lithe frame: how he’d kiss and lick each inch of newly-exposed skin, drag his lips from Q’s navel to the rise of his stiffening prick. Only when the driver behind him begins to sound their horn does James realises, belatedly, that the lights have changed from red to green. And that his cock is half-hard.

He swears under his breath and guns the car away from the halt line -

\- before promptly hitting the next set of lights. And so it goes, all the way across town. He’d swear that Q had a hand in this, if such a thought wasn’t edging dangerously close to paranoia.

James is in a black mood by the time he lets himself into his flat. He pauses in the doorway before turning on the lights, sensing the disturbance in the air, the smell of furniture polish: Rhoda has been in. Sure enough, there’s a cryptic note tacked to the fridge door:

 

_Made too many_

 

Inside, there’s a foil-wrapped plate on a shelf. Beneath the foil, a pie. He eats it right away - it’s chicken and ham - standing in the chill breath of the open fridge door. When he’s done, he licks the crumbs from his fingers, knocks back a tumbler of Scotch and heads for the shower.

Rhoda is James’ cleaner, a taciturn sixtysomething woman hired from an MI6-approved agency. He rarely sees her in person, as he’s away from home more often than not. But once - in that uncertain time between his discharge from hospital and his re-admission to the 00-programme - he was dozing on the sofa when she let herself into the flat. He was dreaming, something to do with a house on fire. Something to do with losing something.

Or somebody.

James woke to the feeling of a cool hand upon his forehead.

‘M,’ he’d murmured, confused.

‘Rhoda,’ said Rhoda.

After that, she started stocking the fridge with milk and eggs and bread, unasked: he doubled her wages. Now there is always coffee in the jar by the kettle and a microwaveable something-or-other in the freezer drawer - even, occasionally, a home-baked offering such as the pie he’s just eaten. He takes the empty liquor bottles down to the recycling point himself, although he doubts that she hasn’t noticed how much he drinks. She probably thinks he’s just another hapless middle-aged divorcee, but it’s all right, he can live with that: sympathy is scarce currency these days.

In the shower, James lets the hot water stream down around him as he starts to pull at his cock. He imagines that Q is there too, naked and vulnerable without his glasses. Imaginary-Q is far more eager for James’ attention than he has ever been in real life: he lets James press him up against the cubicle wall, slide his hand up the back of his thigh, raising his leg against James’ hip. He moans when James’ fingertips tease his crack, seeking the tight clutch of his arsehole.

‘Please,’ breathes Imaginary-Q, writhing like an eel in James' arms, ‘please -’

‘Later,’ James tells him, and places both hands on Imaginary-Q’s shoulders, pushing down. Imaginary-Q is a clever boy: he takes the hint and drops slowly to his knees, kissing along the length of James’ body as he goes. James takes hold of his hair as Imaginary-Q licks and nuzzles at his cock before taking him inside. His mouth feels hotter than the water, so hot, so _good_ -

James comes with a sigh.

*

James is buttoning up his shirt in the bedroom when he remembers Q’s pen, still in his jacket pocket. He takes it out and lies down on the bed, pulling a pillow behind his head.

The barrel of the pen is black, the cap banded with gold. The clip is gold too, pinging softly when James plucks at it. There’s a tiny white star on the cap tassie. It’s quite possibly explosive - for all Q’s protestations, he can’t seem to help himself when it comes to turning small everyday objects into bombs. The pen feels surprisingly heavy in his hand. James handles it warily.

 _Why_ , he thinks. _Why_.

Desire begins to niggle at him once again: the wank he had in the shower has barely taken the edge off his frustration. He palms his rapidly-stiffening cock through his trousers with his free hand. He could go out, go to a bar. Find a slender boy with dark hair and green eyes. Get sucked off in a dim-lit booth, head over to some squalid shared flat in Zone 4, fuck and be back home before daybreak. But the damned pen is probably fitted with a tracker, or a recording device: Q wants to keep an eye on him, or an ear at least. The thought makes James all the more aroused, but irritated at the same time. He remembers the sound of Q tapping a pen against his teeth, over the comms in Tepito, and wonders if this is that very same pen.

James twirls the pen over and over in his fingers, faster and faster until the white star begins to blur.

What should he do?

He could go out and leave the pen here, of course - if he didn’t think there was a very real chance he’d find his flat a smoking ruin when he got back. Or he could take the pen with him, lob it in the fucking river. Let Q think he’d jumped off Vauxhall Bridge. Or been thrown over the parapet. Yeah. Let Q sweat it out for a bit, call for back-up, see what happens when he thinks that -

James doesn’t imagine that Q would be fooled for an instant. He puts the pen on his bedside cabinet and heads back to the kitchen for the bottle of Scotch.

*

The next day brings a breakfast meeting at MI6. When James arrives, M, Q and Moneypenny are already there: Moneypenny as spritely as ever, cramming a bacon butty into her mouth and still managing to talk at a million miles an hour, Q picking sullenly at a croissant. M looks murderous, nursing a bucket-sized mug of black coffee. If James didn’t already know that neither Q nor M are at their best at this hour, he’d suspect - or should that be _hope_? - that they’d had some kind of lovers’ tiff.

Anyhow, he’s no later than usual.

James gives Q the once-over: clean-shaven but with hair artfully tousled, wearing a shirt he hasn’t seen before (a tiny, busy print in red and blue that sets James’ teeth on edge), his habitual air of being faintly appalled at the the world. There’s an empty seat next to Q: James takes it. Q doesn’t even look round.

Ten minutes into the meeting, James realises his mistake: Q smells _divine_. It’s too early in the day for him to have acquired the workshop taint of solder and burnt rubber. James wants to bury his nose in Q’s hair, inhale. Sitting so close to him is proving impossibly distracting. He tries to concentrate on what M is saying, but then all he can think about is whether M makes Q kneel when he takes his mouth, a train of thought that threatens to derail completely when Moneypenny takes advantage of a lull in proceedings to offer round a plate - ‘anyone for a sausage sandwich?’

‘Oh,’ says Q, brightening. ‘Don’t mind if I do.’

James rests his head on his hand so he doesn’t have to watch.

Halfway through the meeting, James makes a point of getting up and taking a sheet of blank paper from the printer drawer. Back at the table, he takes Q’s pen from his pocket and uncaps the lid. The nib glides slickly across the paper, with just the tiniest catch to remind him that it is used to another’s hand, inky letters gleaming in its wake.

‘Nice pen, Jamie,’ says Moneypenny.

‘Isn’t it?’ says James.

‘He’ll have lost it by lunchtime,’ says M.

‘I trust not,’ says Q.

*

Later - much later - James heads down to Q’s workshop. He has little doubt of finding him there, even at this hour. Disappointingly, Q is not alone, and James considers returning tomorrow - despite Q’s instructions - or at least until he hears him dismiss the last of the minions from their posts. But still Q ignores him, even when it’s just the two of them left together in the room and he has walked over to stand right in front of his workbench: ignores him, in fact, until James takes the pen from his pocket and places it gently before him. At this, he looks up.

‘So,’ says James. ‘How does it work?’

Q blinks at him. ‘It’s a pen.’

‘A pen? It’s a Meisterstück.’

‘Indeed it is. How very observant of you.’

‘What was that you were saying about the Q-branch budget?’

Q raises an eyebrow. ‘Actually, it belongs to me. It was a present for completing for my first PhD.’ He doesn’t specify who the present was from. ‘I’m really rather fond of it. I was worried you’d chuck it in the Thames, to be honest.’

James decides not to tell Q that this thought had occurred to him. Instead, he folds his arms and pushes his pelvis forwards, adopting a stance that he thinks shows off his bulk to best advantage. Gratifyingly, he can see Q’s shrewd green eyes tracking across his body. ‘So tell me, Quartermaster. What does it do?’

‘Um...’ Q mimes writing in the air. ‘Is this an early sign of memory loss? Should I ask Medical to run a dementia screen? You were only using it this morning.’

‘Don’t be smart.’

‘I’m sorry.’ Q sighs. ‘I can’t help myself.’

‘Just tell me. Or better still, shut up and show me.’

‘You want a _demonstration_ , is that it?’ When James nods, Q gives him an incredulous look before starting to taking the pen apart. ‘See, this is the cap, and this here is the barrel, with the nib attached. If I unscrew the nib from the barrel -’

‘Where’s the tracker?’

‘What tracker?’

‘The tracker you so cleverly fitted it with, before you gave to me.’

‘Bond. _There is no tracker_.’

A pause, in which Q takes a jeweller’s screwdriver to the pen, humming to himself, and James wonders whether, in the entire history of MI6, a 00-agent has ever kneecapped the Quartermaster. Just, y’know, for being an insufferable prick.

After a while, Q sits back and rubs his chin with his thumb, leaving behind a tiny smear of blue ink. James wants to lean in and lick the smudge away. Writing ink would taste bitter, he thinks. Mineral. Like semen.

‘Ha,’ says Q. ‘Did you think I wanted to know whether you were out on the prowl again last night?’

‘But I wasn’t,’ says James, softly. He doesn’t say: _I had a drink and a wank and then quite a few more drinks before turning in, does that make you feel better?_ Maybe Q already knows, or has guessed.

Q sniffs. ‘I didn’t actually think you would be.’ The pen is pieces now, laid out neatly on the desk before him. ‘And this here,’ he says, as if to himself, poking one of the various components, ‘is the feed -’

Anger flares in the pit of James’ belly. ‘So if you weren’t tracking me because you’re fucking smart enough that I wasn’t going anywhere anyway, what exactly was the point of having me babysit your precious bloody pen all night?’

Q shoots him a sideways glance. His expression suggests that the answer to this question must be painfully obvious to everyone in the world other than James himself. ‘Because,’ he says, ‘everything I have ever entrusted to you is returned to me in bits.’

James harrumphs. ‘Unfair. There’s barely as much as a fingerprint on that bloody pen.’

Q picks up the barrel of the pen, tilts it to the light, frowns.

‘What is this? Some sort of test?’

Q puts the barrel back down and gives a barely perceptible shrug.

The distance around the workbench that separates them seems immense - intergalactic, almost - yet can be circumnavigated in mere steps. Now James is right next to Q’s chair, standing over him. ‘Did I pass?’

Q is still staring at the pieces of the neatly dismembered pen. James reaches out a hand and cups Q’s jaw. He can feel Q’s carotid pulse ticking beneath his fingertips, the faintest scratch of stubble against his palm.

‘Well?’ James drags his thumb across Q’s lower lip. It’s soft, and full: he wants to rest his cock there. Q’s eyelids flicker, long dark lashes behind the lenses of his glasses, and he touches the tip of his tongue to James’ thumb, the briefest caress.

‘ _You_ -’ James sucks in a breath, resists the temptation to force his thumb between Q’s lips into the wet heat of his mouth, or else to jerk his hand away and back-hand him hard across the face. Instead, he asks again, _‘Did I?’_

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Stay tuned, for smut. Possibly. Or maybe just more delicious teasing. Who even knows at this point.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And finally, some actual filth :P

‘Bond,’ says Q, ‘for _fuck’s_ sake’ - and he’s pushing his chair back from the bench and for a moment James expects to be ordered out of the workshop, but -

‘Go on, then -’

Q is fumbling with his belt, opening his flies. And even though James’ fantasy had Imaginary-Q kneeling at his feet, he doesn’t hesitate for a moment before dropping to his knees.

‘ _Here_.’ Q pulls out his cock. ‘You can suck it if you want it so badly -’

He’s bigger than James had imagined him to be, and rock-hard, his cockhead flushed the same deep pink as his lips. He must have been hard under the bench all this time: James cannot help a groan of sympathy as his own cock twitches in his pants. He leans in. Q takes hold of himself and smacks his cock against James’ lips, leaving wet smears of precome. James chases Q’s cockhead with his tongue, laps at the very tip of him.

‘I can taste you,’ he murmurs, just before he slides his lips down Q’s shaft, and that’s it, that’s all it takes, Q is bucking and moaning and filling James’ mouth with warm, salty spurts of come.

‘Fuck,’ gasps Q. ‘Bond - oh - _fuck_ -’

‘Mm.’ James sucks at him, swallows. He works his tongue against the underside of Q’s cock, feeling the answering pulses beneath the skin, subsiding now. Q’s hands have crept up into his hair. James draws back and lets Q’s wet cock slide from his mouth. He licks and kisses along its length, without using his hands, enjoying the weight of it against his cheeks and chin. Then he teases the last traces of come from Q’s slit, making him shudder.

The breathy little noises that Q made as he came were almost unbearably exciting: James is so fucking hard for him now. But if he had thought that Q might reciprocate in kind, he is mistaken - and there’s only the tiniest wobble in Q’s voice when he says, quite clearly:

‘Get your cock out and touch yourself for me.’

James finds himself scrambling to obey, wrestling his trousers and pants down around his thighs so that Q can get a good look at the shape and size of him, the way his foreskin is drawn all the way back, his full balls -

‘Like you did in Tepito,’ adds Q, and fuck, _yes_ , that’s good, that works. James leans back on his haunches, one hand braced on the floor, the other moving fast on his cock. He stares up at Q’s face, right into those calculating green eyes, but Q is watching James’ hand moving over and over with the same intent expression he wears when programming or building bombs.

The tiny part of James’ brain that is still capable of rational thought suggests that perhaps he shouldn’t be finding this quite so arousing.

He tells it to shut the fuck up.

James pauses for a moment to spit in his palm, works the mouthful up and down along his length. He rubs his fingers over his cockhead, slippery with saliva and precome. The sensation has him panting. Christ, what he wouldn’t do for Q’s mouth to be on him now -

‘Ready to come for me, Bond?’ asks Q. He’s holding his own half-hard cock, stroking it slowly. His expression is rapt.

‘I - _fuck_ -’ James rears up onto his knees, shooting hard into his own palm, cock jerking.

He closes his eyes. For a few moments all he can register is the sound of his own harsh breathing and the heaviness of his cock, still throbbing in his hand.

‘Jesus fucking Christ,’ he breathes, and looks up.

Q is still watching him, his features registering a disconcerting combination of fascination and faint amusement. There’s a roll of scratchy blue paper on the workbench. Q tears off a length and hands it to James without a word. James wipes his hands and mouth and zips himself up as Q attends to his own state of disarray. There’s a wastepaper basket by Q’s chair, incongruously decorated with Star Wars characters. James chucks in the crumpled wad of blue paper and wonders what Yoda, in his infinite wisdom, would have to say about all of this.

_Train yourself to let go of everything you fear to lose._

James is unsure as to whether Q might expect a kiss, or some other form of post-orgasmic tenderness, and he’s vaguely surprised to note that the idea is not without appeal. He places his hands on Q’s thighs, kneels up: he thinks he’d like for Q to taste himself on his tongue, underline the intimacy of their exchange.

But Q’s mouth is set in a thin tight line. ‘You should go,’ he says. He pushes James from his lap - rather in the manner one might shrug off an insistent pet - and turns back to his workbench. ‘I’ve got important work to do here.’

‘Have you now,’ says James, his tone ripe with suggestion.

‘Yes,’ says Q, in a way that tells James he is not going to take the hint and engage in a second round. ‘There’s some CCTV footage that needs wiping. Quite imperative that it doesn’t fall into the wrong hands.’

James tries to catch his eye, but Q is staring resolutely at his laptop screen. ‘All right,’ he says.

He gets up. His knee hurts. Christ, maybe he’s getting too old to be giving blow-jobs on concrete floors. He won’t rub it. He sees how Q’s glance flicks towards him, and knows that Q has registered the slight tension in his posture. Has probably stored the knowledge of that weakness away for later, alongside god-knows-whatever-else he has already observed, or guessed.

‘Pitiless little shit, aren’t you?’ says James, wryly.

‘You got what you wanted.’ Q is tapping at his keyboard.

‘And did you?’

Q’s lip twitches. ‘I’d say I was satisfied with your performance on this mission, yes.’

James walks out of the workshop and back to the underground carpark without a backward glance. He forces himself not to limp as his stiff knee eases, not knowing whether Q is watching - either from his chair or via the CCTV that covers his route from the building. He wonders what Q will do now. Maybe he’ll make a copy of the incriminating footage for himself before he deletes it. Or a copy for M. Maybe they’ll watch it together, and at the end Q will slip silently onto the floor between M’s spread knees and take his cock into his mouth -

The thought rankles. In the gym the following morning, James throws punch after punch at the swinging leather bag until he’s drenched with sweat and his fists and shoulders burn. He feels like a starving man who has been thrown a crumb of something delicious: hungrier than ever.

*

James doesn’t see or hear from Q for the next couple of days. He doesn’t really expect to. Nonetheless, the memory of their encounter remains tantalisingly sharp in his mind: he beats off over and over again to the recollection of Q’s stiff cock, the seashelly taste of his come. But by the time an entire week has gone by, he reckons he can afford to go back on the offensive.

Right now, there’s no need for him to visit Q’s workshop or the Q-branch offices, and to do so would communicate an eagerness he thinks is best kept concealed - for the time being at least. But he can wait: an opportunity will no doubt present itself. Sure enough, one afternoon he runs into Q - alone, carrying a computer monitor under one arm - in one of the myriad quiet corridors in the bowels of MI6. Q nods at him, without speaking. He looks as if he’s planning to hurry past, but James blocks his way.

‘Quartermaster,’ he says.

‘Bond,’ says Q.

James decides to get straight to the point. ‘You didn’t last long.’

Q glances around. ‘Not now,’ he says, even though there’s nobody about to hear them.

‘How long did it take? Twenty seconds? Thirty? I know you’re young, but -’

Q’s ears are turning a gratifying pink. ‘I’ve not had - well - it’s been a while,’ he says. ‘And you - your tongue -’

James waits.

‘Felt so fucking hot,’ Q says, at last. He hoists the monitor higher on his hip. He looks uncharacteristically flustered.

‘I can think of some other places where I could put my tongue,’ says James. ‘My _hot_ tongue. If you’d like me to.’

Q looks up and down the corridor, as if expecting - or hoping - that somebody else will come along and force an end to the conversation, but he does not move to walk away. ‘Maybe,’ he says.

‘You think I’m going to act on _maybe_?’ says James, softly. ‘After what happened before? If you want it, tell me.’

Q rubs the back of his neck. ‘All right then,’ he says. ‘All right. Well - I mean. Yes.’

James waits.

‘Bond,’ says Q. ‘I want you to rim me.’

James inclines his head so that he is speaking directly into Q’s ear. ‘I’ll need clearer directions from you, Quartermaster.’

A pause, then Q speaks quickly, quietly. ‘I want you to get behind me and kiss and lick my arsehole until I’m about to come.’ His voice reassumes its usual acerbic tone. ‘Is that clear enough, or should I draw you a fucking diagram? I’m assuming that you wouldn’t be _entirely_ averse to me finishing in your mouth again, given that you were on your knees sucking my cock nine days ago.’

James cannot help but grin. The filthy words sound almost unfeasibly arousing when articulated in Q’s precise public school tones. ‘Now _there’s_ an invitation,’ he says. He lets his hand settle over his flies. ‘Do you want my RSVP in writing, or will a verbal confirmation do?’

Q steps back and throws him an irritated look, for all that his face is flushed. ‘Just so you know,’ he says. ‘This. It doesn’t mean anything.’

‘No,’ says James, comfortably.

‘Glad we’re both on the same page.’ Q raises an eyebrow as James stands blatantly squeezing his crotch. ‘Now get out of my way, you testosterone-addled thug.’

James snorts and steps aside to let Q pass, watches him go. Watches his pert little arse in his stupid plaid trousers, knowing what Q wants him to do with it. Half-way down the corridor, Q stops and turns and says, ‘Come find me later.’


	8. Chapter 8

James licks delicately around Q’s arsehole, probes the rim with the very tip of his tongue. ‘Like this?’ he asks. ‘Or like this?’ He licks him again, this time making his tongue broad and flat, sweeping it up and along Q’s crack.

‘B-both,’ says Q. Were it not for the tremble in his voice he might as well have been discussing prototypes in Q-branch - and were it not also for the fact he is currently knelt on James’s sofa, leaning over the arm rest with his trousers and pants at half-mast. ‘Both are... _good_.’

‘ _Good_ , you say? Hmm. Reckon I can do better than that.’ James spreads Q’s arse with his hands, kisses him lewdly. Then he alternates with pressing devilish little licks and kisses to Q’s hole until Q makes a needy, desperate sound. ‘Gorgeous boy.’ He pulls Q’s prick back between his legs, sucks at his cockhead, tasting precome. ‘Christ. You’re enjoying this, aren’t you? My tongue in your arse.’

‘Well,’ says Q, seemingly having recovered his composure, ‘I don’t think you require the assistance of a genius to work that one out.’

James ignores the jibe. He’s kneeling on the floor behind Q - on a cushion, to spare his griping knee - with his own cock sticking out from his open fly. He’s monumentally, brutally hard. ‘You know,’ he says, ‘I could give you more than this.’ He weighs his heavy cock in his palm. ‘So much more.’

‘Could you now,’ says Q. He sounds as if he’s aiming for _unimpressed_ , but the effect is somewhat spoilt by the way his words trail off into a moan as James licks into him again.

‘Oh yes.’ James rubs the pad of his thumb against the tight spit-slick pucker of Q’s hole. ‘I could finger you. Use as much lube as you need, open you up nice and slow until you’re so ready to fuck. Take you to my bed. Sit you on my cock, let you ride it. Don’t tell me you wouldn’t enjoy coming with a big cock in your arse -’

‘Stick to the brief, Bond,’ says Q.

 

_Earlier_

When James goes to meet Q in his workshop, he notes how Q’s hair is still slightly damp: he must have taken a shower. Even though James wouldn’t have minded one way or the other - and, to be honest, he prefers to taste skin and sweat rather than soap, especially when he’s with another man, something primal about nosing into those headily-scented crevices at armpit, arse, bollocks - he can’t help finding it oddly endearing.

They take the lift down to the underground carpark together, Q waffling on about some new explosive device or other: James supposes it’s cover for the CCTV system. It’s not until they’re sat in James’ car that James asks, ‘So where are we going?’

‘Yours,’ says Q.

‘Why?’ says James. He turns the key in the ignition. He’s vaguely surprised that Q doesn’t want this encounter to be on home turf.

‘Because my cats wouldn’t like you.’

‘How do you know?’ asks James, affronted. ‘They might.’

‘No.’ Q shakes his head, looks mournful. ‘They really, really wouldn’t.’

The drive passes in silence, Q staring out of the window. James bites back curses at every useless ignorant fucker who dares to get in his way, sneaks little glances at his passenger whenever they stop at a set of lights: the soft, oh-so-touchable hair, the elegant angle of a cheekbone outlined in flickering neon. Ordinarily, he wouldn’t take anyone back to his flat for sex. But Q already knows where he lives, what he does. There’s no need for subterfuge here, and that in itself feels like something of a relief.

When James opens his front door, he’s met with a pleasant smell of clean laundry and ironing spray: Rhoda has been in. He stands aside to let Q step inside first. Q glances around, then starts shrugging off his jacket.

‘Here,’ says James. He feels a sudden need to play the attentive host. ‘Let me hang that up for you.’

Q hands him his jacket without a word, walks over to the sofa and sits down. James hangs his own jacket alongside Q’s before sitting down next to him. Q half-turns to face him: his expression is expectant. _Here we go_ , thinks James, _here we bloody go_ , and leans in for a kiss.

‘Hey.’ Q stops him with a hand on his chest. ‘What happened to making me dinner and blowing me while I ate it? I’m bloody starving.’

‘Oh,’ says James. _Bugger_ , he thinks. He can’t imagine that a microwave dinner is going to cut it here: he wonders if Q would be averse to him ringing for a takeaway. ‘I’ll see what I can do.’

James gets up and opens the fridge. There’s an unfamiliar casserole dish inside. He lifts off the lid, hardly daring to hope. _Rhoda_ , he thinks, _oh, Rhoda_. The woman is nothing short of an angel. Hell, he’ll have to triple her wages after this. Quadruple them, even. Leave her a massive fuck-off bouquet of roses in the sink every week. Remember her in his will. She’ll probably outlive him, after all.

‘I made beef stew last night,’ he says, airily, taking out the casserole dish and placing it on the counter-top. ‘Plenty to go round.’

‘Marvellous,’ says Q, picking up the remote and aiming it at the TV. ‘Bring it on.’

‘Do you want a drink?’ James asks him. ‘Scotch?’

‘Yeah,’ says Q, without looking round. ‘Why not.’

While Q sits chortling at some idiocy on the TV, sipping his Scotch, James busies himself microwaving two bowls of stew and buttering slices of bread. He downs two tumblers of Scotch waiting for the microwave to ping, then places everything on a tray and carries it over to the coffee table.

‘Here you go,’ he says. He sits down next to Q and picks up a bowl and spoon, digs in. The stew is dark, dense and meaty, nuggets of carrot and potato and something that might possibly be swede nestled alongside the chunks of beef: delicious.

‘Wow,’ Q says happily, spooning stew into his mouth. ‘This is great. James Bond, domestic goddess. Who’d have thought it?’

James shrugs. ‘Old family favourite. Perfected over generations.’

‘You’ll have to give me the recipe,’ says Q.

‘It’s top-secret,’ says James. ’I could tell you, but then I’d have to kill you.’

Q snorts and helps himself to another slice of bread. James wolfs down his portion of stew, chucks a cushion onto the floor in front of Q and sinks to his knees.

Q gives him an amused look. ‘Hang on a sec.’ He reaches around James to place his bowl on the coffee table and starts fishing around in his backside pocket. ‘Here.’

James laughs softly, surprised and more than a little excited by the sight of the black rubber ring placed on his palm. ‘You want to last a bit longer this time? Should I be flattered, Quartermaster?’

Q shrugs, but his cheeks are reddening. ‘Just get a move on and get it on me. Before I get too hard.’

James slips the ring over his thumb. He slides his hands along Q’s thighs, mouths his crotch through his trousers. ‘I’d best hurry up then.’

‘Yes,’ says Q. ‘Please do.’

‘Need some lube on this thing first,’ says James. He pads into the bedroom, retrieves the lube from his bedside cabinet, kneels back at Q’s feet.

Q has taken the opportunity to unzip his flies and pull his cock out. He’s still soft, but his eyes grow dark as he watches James wiping lube around the inside of the cock-ring.

‘So. Bond.’

‘What is it now?’ James cups Q’s balls. ‘Move forward a bit.’

Q obliges. ‘You fuck men.’

‘You know I do.’

‘But not as often as you fuck women.’

‘No.’

‘Why not?’

It’s a fair question. As James works Q’s bollocks through the ring, gently folds his cock to ease the shaft through, he wonders why he has never bothered to ask himself this before. ‘Maybe I like eating pussy more than I like sucking cock.’

‘Really?’ Q smirks down at him. His prick is already stiffening under James’ touch, the foreskin drawing back from the head. The black ring circling his sac and the root of his cock looks sweetly obscene. He’s mouth-watering, edible: James sighs, feels his own cock begin to harden.

‘Fine. Whatever. Maybe I’m just not meeting the right men.’

‘Ha,’ says Q. ‘You certainly do go to some terrible clubs.’

James isn’t even going to bother to ask Q how he knows this, although he thinks _terrible_ is a bit harsh. Doubtless the clubs he favours are not fashionable enough for Q’s liking, but he’s a middle-aged, middle-class guy looking for discreet hook-ups - not the cutting edge of the gay scene. ‘Or maybe I have met a man whom I really, really, want to fuck, but he’s more interested in fucking with my head.’

‘Well,’ says Q, ‘if you wanted to suck that man’s cock _right now_ , I think you’d find him amenable.’

‘That’d make a change,’ says James.

‘Hush.’ Q takes hold of his cock, angles it at James’ mouth. ‘Make yourself useful.’

James leans in, nuzzles and kisses the head of Q’s cock. He closes his eyes, licks all around the ridge. When he suckles gently at the tip, chasing the faint trace of salt, he hears Q take a deep, shuddering breath.

James opens his eyes. Q is watching him, cheeks flushed, lips half-parted and rosy. _Fuck_ , thinks James: how much he wants to take that mouth, see those lips shaping a perfect O around his shaft. Obliterate every thought of that bastard Mallory getting to do the same. He says, ‘We could take this to the bedroom, if you’d rather.’

‘I haven’t finished my dinner yet,’ says Q. He picks up his bowl again.

‘Cheeky fucker,’ says James.

Q raises an eyebrow. ‘This is _your_ kink,’ he says. ‘Remember?’

‘All right,’ says James, ‘all right -’

He bobs his head up and down on Q’s cock. Q makes a valiant attempt to finish his beef stew, but after only a few more mouthfuls he gives up and puts the bowl down. James reaches out to take hold of his wrists and places Q’s hands onto his head: Q takes the hint and starts thrusting up into James’ mouth. James presses his tongue against the underside of Q’s cockhead, hollows his cheeks, sucks hard.

‘Oh, god,’ whispers Q, hips surging, ‘keep doing that, I want to come in your mouth again, _yes_ -’

James lifts Q’s hands from his head and pulls back, letting Q’s stiff cock slip wetly from his mouth. ‘I thought you wanted me to rim you first.’

‘Yes,’ says Q. ‘I still do.’


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, I hope peeps are still reading this. Real life, and all of that.

Over the next couple of months, James and Q fall into a routine of sorts. Two or sometimes three times a week, Q comes round to James’ apartment after work. They eat dinner together (with the advantage of prior warning, James is able to impress Q with a variety of dishes of his own making, although he’s never forgotten how grateful he was to Rhoda that first night).

Dinner leads to drinks, and drinks inevitably lead to Q kneeling half-naked on the couch with James licking and kissing at his arsehole. Sometimes Q pulls himself off as he does it, and sometimes James finishes him with his mouth.

And that’s as far as it goes.

Their lips never meet. Q doesn’t allow himself to be penetrated and he doesn’t touch James in return. James can’t believe that Q doesn’t want more, and would say as much, but he’s still wary of pushing his luck. He suspects that insistence - never mind force - would earn him a harsher punishment than a mere diversity training session. Sometimes, James gets his cock out and masturbates as Q watches, although there’s a distinct sense that this is tolerated rather than invited, which (perversely enough) only makes James enjoy it more. But it’s more usual for Q to decide he wants to go home with James left still unsatisfied. James can barely wait for him to make it out of the apartment before he’s spitting in his palm and working his hand along the length of his stiff cock, doubled over with the need to come _now_ , so hard it aches.

To start with, James finds this all rather odd, if undeniably exciting. It’s a certainly a novelty for him to be engaged in an affair where he doesn’t have the sexual upper hand. He’s surprised to find he rather enjoys it. And the very thought of eating Q’s pert arse or sucking him off never fails to make his dick throb. But as time goes on, feelings of frustration begin to take over. He can hardly complain about being employed in such a manner, but there’s the niggling sense of being regarded as a _project_ , as if he is little more than a piece of equipment that can be calibrated to respond to Q’s whims and desires. Resentment gnaws at him.

One evening, long after all the Q-branch minions have clocked off, James corners Q at his workbench.

‘Tricky, aren’t you?’

‘I beg your pardon?’

‘You know what I’m talking about.’

‘Do I?’ Q’s tone belies his words.

James leans in close. Q’s nostrils flare: James can’t tell whether he’s aroused or annoyed. He presses on. ‘I didn’t think you’d be like this.’

‘Like what, exactly?’ Q rolls his eyes, but he doesn’t wait for an answer. ‘Did you think you’d only have to snap your fingers and I’d be begging you to stick your legendary cock in me? Do I look _that_ desperate for a good porking?’

Denial seems pointless under such circumstances. ‘Yes.’

‘Well,’ says Q. He returns to tinkering with an electronic something-or-other. ‘I could tell you that I was sorry to disappoint, but I think we both know that’s not true.’

This little exchange leaves James in a filthy mood - who the fuck does Q think he is? Yeah, so James may have been blowing him for weeks, but his prick doesn’t shoot champagne and caviar. Although it’s possible that Q realises he may have overstepped the mark, for he makes a point tracking down James later that same week - to the agents’ gym, where James is busy taking his frustration out on the equipment.

‘Bond,’ Q says. He sounds almost conciliatory.

James lowers himself slowly from the pull-up bars. He knows Q is watching the bunch and swell of his muscles. Even now he refuses to believe that Q doesn’t yearn for a good fucking (deep and hard with Q on his elbows and knees, the way James likes it with men. The way James usually has sex with men). He would be more than happy to oblige. Bloody ridiculous, he thinks, this masquerade of self-denial. ‘What now?’

Q hands him a towel. ‘Tonight. I could come round.’

James wipes his forehead and the back of his neck, taking his time. He hands the towel back to Q before answering. ‘No,’ he says. Sweet as it is to feel Q coming in his mouth, to hear the delightful noises he tries in vain to hold back as he spills, to study his O-face - that enticing little crease between his eyebrows - James has just about reached the limit of his tolerance for Q’s tedious little games. All he wants is to fuck Q, or even to have Q suck him off, and then it’s over, done. ‘I’ve got a date.’

‘Ah,’ says Q. He seems much less perturbed by this than James would like. ‘Well then. Best of British.’ He extends his hand. ‘To you both.’

James smacks Q’s hand aside and stalks away.

As a matter of fact, James doesn’t have a date but it’s not hard to arrange one. With a woman. Somebody with whom he’s familiar enough to anticipate warmth and softness rather than prickles and sarcasm. The female sex is supposed to be more complicated than the male but he doesn’t think he’s ever tangled with anyone as maddening or contradictory as Q: it’s like trying to lasso mercury.

James meets his date in a bar. She’s wearing a tailored cream trouser-suit and a black silk blouse, unbuttoned far enough for him to catch a glimpse of tanned tit. James feels a warm glow of arousal: here they are, two consenting adults on exactly the same page. He stands to greet her, kisses her cheek. She smells of flowers.

‘You look beautiful,’ he murmurs, and he thinks he means it. Even if he can’t help but notice that her eyes are not _quite_ as fascinatingly green, her lips not _quite_ as plush as -

He tells himself that’s the last time he’s going to think about Q tonight.

 

‘So,’ says Q. ‘How did it go?’

James mentally re-runs the events of the previous evening. How he took the woman for dinner and thought of Q. How, back at her place, he tongued her from clit to arsehole and thought of Q.

How he fucked her, first her mouth and then her pussy and finally her arse, and thought of Q. How he made sure she came - several times - when all the while he was thinking of Q. Even so, he thought he’d got away with it - God knows he’d put his back into it, so to speak - right up until the moment he left.

At the door, he made to kiss her but she turned away, half-smiled. Her nipples made tiny peaks in the ivory satin of her robe. The aroma of their sex still clung to her, sweeter than her perfume. He almost felt like going back in for another round: one final attempt to clear his head.

‘You know,’ she said, ‘you really should tell her how you feel.’

There seemed little point in trying to explain, and even less in quibbling over the details. The astuteness of her observation has left him uneasy: James is more familiar with his lovers (of both sexes) making accusations of emotional impenetrability. He’s beginning to feel as if his half-slaked lust for Q - and that’s all it is, lust, as soon as he gets what he wants he’ll be off - must show through him like the lettering in a stick of seaside rock. But here, now, there’s little point in pretending. ‘She wasn’t you.’

‘No,’ says Q. His tone is neutral rather than smug. For this, James finds himself grateful.

Q takes a sip of tea from his white Scrabble mug. James watches the pale column of his throat as he swallows.

‘Do you want me to come over?’ says Q. ‘Later?’

‘Yes,’ says James.

Q’s eyebrow twitches, minutely.

‘I’m not bloody begging.’

‘No,’ says Q. ‘Of course you’re not.’


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *taps mic*
> 
> Er, hello...!

  
James is eye-wateringly, teeth-clenchingly hard. He’s hard from the moment Q settles himself wordlessly into the passenger seat of his car, filling the confined space with the scent of a recently-smoked cigarette and a distinct aura of annoyance.

  
James inhales deep. ‘Tough day?’ he finds himself asking. Just to make Q turn his head and fix him with that cool green gaze.

  
‘I’ve had better,’ says Q, although he does not elaborate, merely runs a long-fingered hand through his hair. He doesn’t look at James. ‘Can we leave now or are you planning on making meaningless chit-chat in the car park for the rest of the night? Because I’m dying of hunger here.’

  
‘There’s a McDonalds round the corner,’ says James, in the voice he usually reserves for informing people that he is about to kill them. ‘I’ll drop you off.’ He revs the engine hard before he pulls away, sending the car screeching up the ramp. Q merely chuckles at his posturing, and James feels an obscure sense of pleasure.

  
Tonight, James is cooking. He decides to make risotto, believing that the slow stirring of stock into rice will act as a meditation, take his mind off the insistent rise of his cock: he’s wrong. Instead, the process seems to focus his entire being on just how badly he wants to strip Q of his stupid designer-nerd clobber, touch and suck his prick — kiss his arsehole — turn him on his back and lift his ankles before penetrating him, lots of lube and oh-so-slowly —

  
_God._ James presses his groin up against the kitchen counter, before realising that he is coming dangerously close to humping inanimate objects in his frustration. Meanwhile, the object of these fevered desires is lounging on the sofa, working his way through a bowl of pistachio nuts and playing with his mobile, oblivious. Distracted both by Q’s proximity and the need to manage his own arousal, James burns himself on the edge of the pan.

  
‘Shit!’ he hisses. He hurls the ladle into the sink and turns the cold tap on full, letting the water cascade over his knuckles.

  
‘Everything all right over there?’ Q calls out.

  
‘Fine,’ says James. ‘Third-degree burns only. Nothing that a decent plastic surgeon couldn’t fix.’

  
‘Good-o,’ says Q, absently. James half-turns to look at him: he hasn’t lifted his gaze from his phone. ‘Do you want to see that chap at Barts again? The one who darned your bullet wounds?’

  
‘Hmm. No. Might be awkward.’

  
Q puts his phone aside and raises himself up on one elbow, peers over at James. ‘How so?’

  
‘I fucked his secretary.’

  
Q rolls his eyes. ‘You’ve screwed most of Six’s admin department. Tell me something new.’

  
‘I did it in his office.’

  
‘Stay classy, Bond.’

  
James watches his skin reddening under the water. ‘They’re married, you know. Lovely picture of the ceremony on the desk. Groom and groom in Saville Row’s finest.’

  
‘Like I say.’ Q clicks his tongue. ‘Dear God. If you were one of my cats, I could just have you neutered.’

  
‘If you were a cat, I’d have you made into mittens. Maybe a matching scarf.’

  
Q sneers at him. ‘You don’t _do_ pets though, do you, Bond? Let’s face it, you couldn’t even keep a pot plant alive —’

  
‘All right,’ says James, tersely. ‘That’s enough. Get your lazy arse off that sofa and give me a hand.’

  
Q moves sullenly, but he helps James plate up the food and pour the wine all the same. James wonders what has been going on in Q-branch to put Q in such a foul temper. He can’t help but wonder whether Q has had some kind of disagreement with Mallory. Or maybe Q hungers for Mallory’s attention and never quite gets enough. _Whatever_ , James thinks. _Whatever_.

  
They sit down together on the sofa to eat, balancing the plates on their laps. As James picks up his fork, he sees Q’s glance flick towards the red weals on his hand.

  
‘Actually,’ says Q, ‘that does look rather painful.’

  
‘Excruciating,’ says James. He lifts his hand to his mouth, touches his tongue to his knuckles, aware that Q is watching. ‘Ow,’ he says, unnecessarily.

  
Q inclines his head. ‘Anything I can do?’

  
‘You could kiss it better?’

  
‘Oh, do give it a rest,’ says Q, crossly. He digs his fork into his risotto, making no attempt to conceal his irritation.

  
They eat in silence. James thinks about what will come next: how, more likely than not, he will end up rimming Q and/or sucking him off, yet again. He will take what he can get, even if he can’t get everything that he wants. He’s well aware that he’s being played. It’s frustrating but he can’t seem to stop himself from coming back for more, even though the game feels as if it is rigged against him. For all the satisfaction that he derives from the situation — and he does, he can’t deny that he enjoys pleasuring Q, as much as he wishes for reciprocation — Q’s corrosive disdain is eating away at his sense of self. In the deepest recesses of his mind there is a worrying notion that Q could walk away from all of this without so much as a backward glance, whereas he himself might not find it quite so easy.

  
James takes a ruminative sip of his wine. ‘Do you remember what you said to me, Q? About not liking women?’

  
Q raises an eyebrow. ‘What of it?’

  
‘Just thinking how I’m hard-pressed to name anyone _you_ like. Of either gender.’

  
Q shrugs, sets his empty plate down on the coffee table. ‘That’s because 99.9% of the human race is a waste of carbon. Which is not to say I don’t have my favourites.’

  
‘Really? You certainly don’t seem to like _me_ ,’ says James. ‘For instance,’ he adds, realising a little too late how self-pitying this sounds.

  
‘Nonsense.’ Q is indignant. ‘I’ve risked my professional reputation for you. My entire career, in fact. _Umpteen_ times.’

  
‘And still you’d sacrifice me in the interests of national security without a second thought.’

  
‘Of course.’ Q laughs, low. James is reminded uncomfortably — yet with an undeniable thrill — that this unassuming, geeky-looking young man could quite easily have him killed at any time, and his reasoning would not be disputed: James has no champion in Mallory. ‘Even so,’ Q continues,  ‘do you really think I have sexual encounters with people I don’t like?’

  
‘It wouldn’t surprise me,’ says James. ‘You’re a perverse little bugger, after all.’

  
This earns him a sudden, unguarded smile. James seizes the moment and places his hand on Q’s knee. Leans in, until his lips brush Q’s jaw, the faint rasp of stubble there. ‘Q,’ he murmurs. ‘Come on now. Let me take you to bed. Let me fuck you.’

  
‘Why?’ says Q. James can sense that he isn’t smiling anymore, although he doesn’t move away.

  
‘ _Why?_ ’

  
‘Yes. You heard. Why? Why should I?’

  
‘Because…’ James falters, sits back. ‘Christ. I don’t even know anymore. _Because._ Because I’ve been hard for you all night, even though you’re acting like an obnoxious little shit. Because you’d look lovely sitting on my cock. Or sucking on it. Because not having you in my bed is driving me insane. Because, because, because. If I knew what I had to say to make you want to say yes, I’d have said it weeks ago.’

  
‘Well,’ says Q. His hand moves to cover James’, still resting on his knee, settles delicately over the burn. ‘ _Please_ would be a start —’

  
‘Q. Please,’ says James, automatically. ‘But I told you before — I’m not begging —’

  
‘No?’ says Q. His eyes are bright, wicked. ‘Not even a little bit?’ And then he is slipping easily from the sofa, one fluid movement bringing him to kneel at James’ feet, his palms sliding up along James’ thighs, warm. ‘You quite sure about that?’

  
James can hardly breathe for his astonishment: Q looks up at him expectantly. ‘Well,’ he murmurs, letting his legs fall open so Q can kneel in closer, ‘now you come to mention it…’

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not gonna promise that the next chapter is imminent, but rest assured it will be utter filth, all the way. At last! :D


End file.
